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For more than 100 years the Society of Professional Journalists has been dedicated to encouraging a climate in which journalism can be practiced more freely and fully, stimulating high standards and ethical behavior in the practice of journalism and perpetuating a free press.

About the Foundation

Since its founding in 1961, the Sigma Delta Chi Foundation has promoted excellence and ethics in journalism. The SDX Foundation is a tax-exempt, 501(c)(3) organization that supports the educational programs of the Society of Professional Journalists and serves the professional needs of journalists and students pursuing careers in journalism.

Excellence in Journalism 2015Sept 18-20, 2015 – Orlando

Excellence in Journalism is the national journalism conference of the Society of Professional Journalists and the Radio Television Digital News Association. Join us in September in Orlando for training, networking, workshops and more!

SPJ Leads

SPJ News

SPJ Blogs: Newest Posts

Quill Headlines

Journalist's Toolbox

@SPJ_Tweets

Connect with SPJ

SPJ on Facebook

Upcoming Eventsand Deadlines

Become an SPJ Member

For more than 100 years the Society of Professional Journalists has been dedicated to encouraging a climate in which journalism can be practiced more freely and fully, stimulating high standards and ethical behavior in the practice of journalism and perpetuating a free press.

About the Foundation

Since its founding in 1961, the Sigma Delta Chi Foundation has promoted excellence and ethics in journalism. The SDX Foundation is a tax-exempt, 501(c)(3) organization that supports the educational programs of the Society of Professional Journalists and serves the professional needs of journalists and students pursuing careers in journalism.

Excellence in Journalism 2015Sept 18-20, 2015 – Orlando

Excellence in Journalism is the national journalism conference of the Society of Professional Journalists and the Radio Television Digital News Association. Join us in September in Orlando for training, networking, workshops and more!

Diversity CommitteeOn both chapter and national levels, SPJ provides an open forum for the discussion of diversity issues in journalism. This committee's purpose is to promote a broader voice in newsrooms across the country and expand the depth and quality of news reports through better sourcing. Its ongoing project is the compilation of experts — primarily women, gays and lesbians, people of color and people with disabilities — through the Society's Diversity Source Book. The Society's relevance to its member is based on inclusiveness.

Some journalists balk at the idea of deliberately adding underrepresented voices
to the news. They think of it as pandering, or at least distortion. But in fact,
what’s off the mark is most news coverage today. It overemphasizes the
ideas, opinions and prominence of one particular group: usually white, upper-class
males. Sometimes, studies show, other demographic slices get undue emphasis
— particularly in stories about crime or poverty.

If you’re not checking with a breadth of sources, chances are, your story
has got holes.

“This is the community you’re covering,” says Craig Franklin,
producer of news special projects at KRON-TV in San Francisco. In his city,
about half the population is nonwhite.

Mirroring the community is not the same as highlighting ethnic food, traditions
or community gatherings in the news pages. It goes further than incorporating
civil rights, immigration, and race issues in ongoing coverage. It’s beyond
time to throw out the white experience as the norm, as Franklin explained. “You’re
trying to include people as a normal part of the community,” he said.
“Not as the ‘other.’ ”

Indeed. The latest census contained an urgent message to journalists. “Hellloooo?
U.S. demographics are changing.”

I try not to be prejudiced, but being from California I tend to think of Ohio
as lily white. How provincial. Hamilton County, for example, is 23 percent African
American. I had no idea that Houston is 11 percent Asian or Minneapolis-St.
Paul, 12 percent — with the largest Hmong population in the United States.
I didn’t even know that Latinos and Hispanics make up one fifth of the
population in Nevada, the state right next door.

Having seen “The Music Man” as a child, I thought I knew who lived
in Gary, Indiana. Nope. That city is more than 83 percent African American.
Detroit? A full 85 percent.

Pointing out the skew towards whites in story sourcing, KRON’s Franklin
says, “Maybe we’re not doing the best journalism. If about 75 percent
of the U.S. population is white, are 95 percent of the experts white? Is that
the reality? Or does my Rolodex reflect me?”

KRON has a diversity group that meets every week just to talk stories. Franklin,
who is white, says that’s how producers there overcome the disabilities
of a largely monochrome, middle-class newsroom. They talk about how to broaden
reporting beyond their own circle of familiarity – and to look at stories
about racial and ethnic minority groups from the inside. The results? A feature
on Filipino veterans who had been denied government benefits. An award-winning,
two-part series on racial profiling of Arab Americans. “It’s a more
sophisticated approach,” Franklin says.

Carol Ness, a reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle, recalls how useful it
was to have a broad range of Muslim sources already filling her files in the
weeks following Sept. 11. Three years earlier, when Clinton ordered the bombing
of Sudan and Afghanistan, she had produced a profile of Bay Area Islam in one
day. That time she had to rely on one person to link her to the extensive Muslim
population in the area.

We all know this technique will work in a pinch, but it can limit your vision.
As Ness points out, a single source may have a great network, but everyone in
it is likely to have a similar perspective. It’s risky to rely on one
individual — and his or her contacts — to serve as a voice for an
entire community.

Your journalism can only be as good as your sourcing. So why not work a little
harder to make it better?

Sally Lehrman writes about genetics, medicine and health issues for a range
of publications and is national diversity chair for the Society.